Conventional systems of this type include a cable loop with substantially parallel runs wound about two reversing pulleys, one of them driven while the other may be limitedly displaceable in the direction of these runs under a biasing force tending to tension the cable. Upright pylons or posts are installed throughout the length of the loop to carry sustaining pulleys with generally horizontal axes supporting the cable at intermediate locations. The loop may lie in a horizontal or an inclined plane and could also be divided into sections of different slope by curving about such pulleys.
Loads, e.g. cabins or chairs, are secured to the cable--usually in balanced pairs--with the aid of generally C-shaped suspensions, including cable-gripping clamps, maintaining the center of gravity of each load more or less directly below the cable; these suspensions have stems which in many instances are swivelable about a transverse horizontal axis and are laterally outwardly offset from the cable loop in order to clear the cable-engaging pulleys and their posts. In such systems it is often necessary to bend the cable loop laterally at one or more deflection points, e.g. in order to avoid obstacles on the terrain or to provide convenient access at intermediate stations. To this end, deflection pulleys can be readily placed in contact with a run of the cable on the inside of its loop without interfering with the outwardly offset load suspension. Problems arise, however, when the two runs are to be bent parallel to each other, since one run would then have to be deflected by an outside pulley or guide member lying in the path of the suspensions.
Thus, the runs of the loops of conventional cableways either lie in parallel vertical planes or deviate from each other so as to bend only about deflectors disposed inside the loop.